Leaving
by Kat-of-the-Streets
Summary: *Some Series 5 Spoilers* A note written by Simon Bricker and a story told by Violet lead Cora to rethink her life.
1. Chapter 1

AN: I have no idea how good this is. I have been caught up at work more than ever before (I think) and it took me forever to write this.

Please let me know what you think!

Thank you,

Kat

* * *

Cora

"Your ladyship, this has been given to me. For you."

"Thank you, Carson." She takes the note from him and recognizes the handwriting at the first glance. Mr. Bricker. She wonders what he wants. She is afraid of opening the note because she has an inkling of what he wants and she isn't sure she won't give in, he has something to offer her after all, something that Robert does not want to or maybe cannot offer to her anymore. And so she opens the note.

_My dearest Cora,_

_First of all let me apologize for coming to your room unannounced. That was wrong. I should have given you more time. But it is as I said, we both know that something happened between us. You cannot deny that. I admire you, I am in love with you and I think that you love me too. Why would you flirt with me otherwise?_

_I can't offer you a home like Downton Abbey, but I can offer you love. Love that is all encompassing. I would take you with me everywhere, I would never neglect or ignore you. You would be the center of my life. There is nothing I wouldn't do for you._

_I have been invited to a gallery opening in New York. I am leaving in a week. Come to London and I'll take you with me. I'll take you home and if you didn't want to, we'd never have to leave again. _

_Think about it. Please._

_Simon_

It drives tears into her eyes and she sees herself on a ship to New York, actually living in New York again. Somewhere where she won't be recognized as a stranger the moment she opened her mouth. Somewhere where people would take her seriously. And isn't there a chance that she would be taken much more seriously as the wife of an art dealer who obviously cares about her opinion than the wife of an earl who disregards everything she says and married her for her money only in the first place anyway?

She'd have to get a divorce, of course. Going to New York with Bricker but remaining married to Robert is not an option. She'd have to make a clean cut. And why not? Robert does not talk to her anymore, their marriage is in ruins, she doesn't think that it can ever be fixed. Their children are grown-up. Or dead. They don't need her. Nobody needs her for. She has become superfluous. She was superfluous once before. At the beginning of her marriage to Robert. She had given the family the money they wanted, she was just something unpleasant to be dealt with then. But at least they still needed her to produce an heir. Getting her money meant making her the mother of the heir. Only she was never able to give Robert an heir. The only boy they ever conceived she lost. The other three children were girls. Now she isn't needed for that anymore. She can't produce an heir anymore, she is far too old. And it isn't necessary in any case. There is an heir, Mary's son.

Her money is gone. Lost by her husband years ago. She isn't worth anything anymore for the family. No hope for an heir, the money lost. That used to not be a problem when she was still important to Robert, when he still loved her, when she still loved him. She has no idea how much love there is left between them, but she thinks it's negligible. At least on his part. And probably also on her part. She can't love a man who disregards her the way that Robert does. This thought makes her cry because he used to value her opinion, there was a time, quite a long time, decades in fact, when she had the feeling that there was nothing more important to Robert than her. And she loved him so much for it. But that is all gone. Vanished. And she doesn't know why. She can't help but remember his surprise return from America. Where he had gone to rescue her brother. The way he looked at her when he came back. The way he kissed in front of literally everyone living in the village or on the estate. The way he praised her work to the family. The way he had made love to her that night. None of that is left. It got lost somewhere in the overhaul of the estate. With going against tradition in modernizing the estate, he had returned to tradition in their marriage. She has turned into his accessory. The pretty countess who does not embarrass him. She is nothing more. Just a necessity to make his social live easier. Not the anchor to his world anymore, as she once was.

"I am thinking about going to New York soon," she announces at dinner. Everyone looks at her, everyone except for Robert who keeps staring at his plate.

"Why?" Edith asks very surprised, something that earns her an eye roll from Mary. Apparently her eldest daughter knows what is going on.

"Because I've been invited."

"That was very nice of Grandmama." She looks at her middle daughter, who became her youngest daughter when Sybil died.

"It wasn't your Grandmama who invited me. It wasn't my brother either." Her daughters, Tom, her mother-in-law and Isobel all stare at her expectantly. Robert pretends to not have heard. He ignores her completely and this is what makes her snap.

"In fact, I was invited by Simon Bricker." That gets Robert to react. He bangs his fist on the table, gets up, throws his napkin on his plate and leaves without looking at anyone.

"Really Mama, I always thought I was the most heartless person in this family, but apparently I have to hand over the crown to you now."

She looks at Mary who stares back at her, as if to challenge her to disagree. But she can't. She doesn't know what to say.

"I should go and make sure Robert does not drink himself into a stupor." She is astonished by her mother-in-law's words and watches the woman get up. Mary, Edith and Isobel leave as well, she has no idea where to, but right before she leaves the room, Edith stops, looks at her and says

"It does not happen very often. But I agree with Mary." All she can do is stare after her daughter's retreating back.

She looks at Tom, the only one left in the dining room besides her. Even Carson, Barrow and Moseley have left. She supposes that Carson made them leave because Barrow would have never missed something like this on his own accord.

"Don't you want to leave too?" she snaps at Tom.

Tom gives something between a nod a shrug of his head and then looks at her defiantly.

"Cora," he says. She wants to tell him to call her Lady Grantham, but then remembers that she has told Robert a thousand times that she thought it stupid that they still made Tom call them by their titles. Robert of course did not care about that.

"I wish that Sybil was still here to say what I am going to say now. She could be pretty frank if she wanted to be and I think she would have wanted to be exactly that right now. Mary is right, what you have just done is beyond heartless. I know that Robert has been caught up with the overhaul of the estate and maybe not been as considerate to you as he usually is, but are you really prepared to throw away what you have had for 34 years because of a few weeks? A few weeks that were very difficult for Robert? Think about it very carefully, because you are about to throw something away that no one in this family has besides Robert and you." With that Tom leaves and as he tends to do when he is upset, he bangs the door. Although she wonders whether he did it right now because Sybil would surely have banged the door.

The injustice of it all makes her cry. Robert keeps ignoring her, belittling her, in a way he ridicules her, he more or less called her dumb when they were in London, he does all those things and she does one thing, one single thing that wasn't very kind and the whole family turns against her. In that moment she realizes that she does not really think of them as her family anymore. And of course there is only one thing to do. She finishes her wine, gets up, goes to her room, rings for Baxter and begins to pack her suitcases to go to New York.


	2. Chapter 2

AN: First of all, thank you all for the reviews! I am glad you like this story so much!

This chapter was partly inspired by eyeon who commented on another story that she liked the way I wrote Violet.

This chapter is from Violet's perspective. I hope she doesn't seem too out of character, I tried to stay in character but still show her understanding and loving side. We learned quite a lot about her in series five (one of my favorite aspects of S5) and I tried to incorporate that here.

Please let me know what you think!

Kat

* * *

Violet

She could kill her daughter-in-law. She wasn't able to see her son's face but she can very well imagine the crumpled look on it. And she knows that he wants to drink himself under the table now, but that would not help and the boy would regret it endlessly in the morning, so she has to stop him. She hated having to stop his father from drinking, but it is a lot easier to stop Robert. And quite opposed to his father, the boy has a good head on his shoulders when it comes to love and marriage.

He is sitting on one of the sofas, drink in hand and doesn't look up when she enters the room. Contrary to what she usually does, she sits down next to him.

"Robert," she says in as gentle a voice as she can and she knows she sounds as she did when he was still very small and refused to do what his nanny wanted him to do.

He looks at her and doesn't even try to hide the tears streaming down his face.

"She hurt you." She hates talking about feelings, but she has to do it now, she cannot allow her son to let Cora slip through his fingers. There is great love between them, but the trouble with great love is that the people involved have the ability to hurt each other so much more than any other person could hurt them.

"Yes. Very much so. But if that is what she wants, then I can't stop her." With that he takes another gulp of Scotch.

"You hurt her very much as well." Robert looks at her stunned.

"Yes. You did. You've ignored for her months now. You stopped asking her opinion."

"Maybe. But that does not give her the right to do" she watches Robert cast around for words. She knows he is about to yell, she hates to hear him yell but she also knows he needs to let it out.

"whatever it is that she is doing with that art idiot," Robert finishes his sentences and throws the now empty glass into the fire where it shatters in as many pieces as his heart must have been shattered.

She wants to say "at least that stops you from getting drunk" but she bites her tongue. This is not the time to make snarky remarks, this is a time to remember that she is more than a rich, witty, old lady. It is time to remember that she is also a mother, even if her son is a grandfather himself.

"Not from where you are standing."

"What?" He has rounded on her now and she hates it, but there is nothing she can do about it. Once he is in a rage it is hard to stop him. Thankfully he hardly ever is in a rage, he is rather mild-mannered most of the time.

"To her it seems fair."

"So you are on her side? I thought you hated her." Those words hurt her. She knows Robert does not really think that she hates Cora, he knows better than anyone else that she doesn't, but she is not surprised by Robert being angry about her taking Cora's side. Although she doesn't, not fully at least.

"No. I am on your side. I always am on your side. But I understand what Cora is going through. Being ignored by your husband is not very pleasant."

"Neither is finding another man in your wife's bedroom." So this is what made the kettle spill over, proverbially.

"Did they?" She knows she does not really have to voice the question, Robert understands what she means without it. Just like her he hates to talk about such things, although she supposes that he mmust talk to Cora about such things from time to time.

"No. I came in on time. She said she asked him to leave, he said that she hadn't invited him there." She can see in her son's face that he is convinced that both Cora and Mr. Bricker lied to him, that he is sure that Cora did invite Bricker to her room, maybe that she even planned her evening with Bricker in advance.

"And what did you do?"

"I hit that man." She sometimes wonders how old her son is. He looks like a schoolboy now, a boy who has to explain to the headmaster what exactly he did.

"He came to Cora's room uninvited. He had it coming, I'd say," she says and she can't hide the pride in her voice. Of course Robert should not be hitting other men on a regular basis, but in that situation it was the appropriate reaction, especially because she is sure that Robert hit Bricker out of jealousy and not because the man was about to ruin Cora's virtue and thereby her and Robert's reputation. Robert grins, but only for a moment.

"How do I know he wasn't invited?"

"Because that is what Cora says." She would not believe that art dealer, but she believes Cora. A woman who hates going behind her husband's back, a woman who for 34 years has loved her husband with everything she has got. Robert shakes his head.

"You don't understand. I know she is lying to me. She flirted with that man for weeks and weeks, she had dinner with him in London, she let him take her around the National Gallery, she invited him to stay the night when I was supposed to not return before morning."

She sees why Robert believes what he does. He is lost in self-pity, something he is rather good at it, something he inherited from his father.

"Robert, sit down."

"No."

"Robert. Sit. Down." She stares at him and thankfully he gives in. She hates setting his head straight when he is standing and she is not, but she does not want to get up. She is might be a very long conversation and she can't stand for hours.

"She flirted with that man, yes. But she never went beyond what is appropriate. She enjoyed his attention because she is craving for attention." He takes a breath to disagree but she shakes her head.

"No. Listen to me. She is used to a certain kind of attention from you and you've ignored her. And Edith told me that Cora asked you several times to accompany her to London and that she invited Edith to join her and that Bricker at the gallery. Would she really have done that if she had wanted to spend time with that man by herself? Rosamund told me what you said to Cora when she returned from her dinner with Bricker. Although I think that you had a point, the way in which you told her wasn't kind. And don't say that your sister was exaggerating. She wasn't. Rosamund has rooted for Cora and you for 35 years now. It broke her heart."

"Still. She let him stay here when she knew I would not be home."

"When did you tell that you wouldn't home?"

"I don't know. When I told Rosamund I suppose." This exasperates her. Robert certainly is a much better husband to Cora than her husband ever was to her, but sometimes he is just too thickheaded.

"You tell your wife, the woman you have allegedly shared a bed with for three and a half decades, that you won't be home for a night by letting her overhear something you are saying to your sister and then you are surprised that she lets another man she believes to be interested in the family's art, something she is very proud of I might add, stay in the guest wing?"

"She must indeed have been very naïve if she believed him to be interested only in the family's art and friendship with her." She thought so too, for a little while but has since come to realize something.

"Robert, she might have been naïve, yes. But the last time in her life she has had to deal with men pretending to be interested in something they are not just to get to her was when she was nineteen. Ever since the day you proposed to her, you have been the only man in her life. She never looked twice anywhere else. This woman has believed in your marriage from the first moment on. The faith she put in you and the love and devotion she put into your marriage are beyond any form of comparison among everyone we know." There are tears in Robert's eyes now and she hopes he won't cry. She hates to see him cry, even when he was still a small boy, she didn't know what to do then. Of course he didn't cry very often, to her knowledge at least, and neither did Rosamund, but she never learned how to deal with someone crying.

"You are right. But that has changed, hasn't it?"

"Yes. And I want to smack her at the back of her head for it because I think she gave up too easily, I think she should not go to New York and I certainly don't think that a grand announcement at dinner was the right way to tell you. But I also think that it was a desperate call for your attention." He looks at her as if he suddenly understood something.

"You were never happy, were you?"

"What?" She has no idea what he is talking about.

"Papa. He never made you happy. It wasn't only at the end that you weren't happy. You never were happy." That is the last thing she wants to talk about. It is none of Robert's business.

"We were content. That was enough."

"But you would have left. Had there been someone who offered you a different life, you would have left him. That's why you are on Cora's side. Because you would have left too."

She has the feeling that never in her life has anyone looked through her the way Robert looks through her now. He has understood her. Something she hoped that would never happen. And she doesn't know what to say.

"Mama, don't answer. Just don't say anything anymore. Go home. I need to be alone." She wants to say something, she opens and closes her mouth a few times, but no words come out. It is as if she had lost both the ability to speak and to think.

"I will let Cora go. I think I will let her go. Because I don't want her to end up as a frustrated old woman who is dismissive of anyone around her."

She wants to slap him across the face, but once she has realized what he said, he has already left the room.


	3. Chapter 3

A huge 'thank you' to all of you who reviewed this story! I am really glad you like it so much.

And special thanks to settees-under-siege who told me to just follow my instincts with this chapter, which is just what I did. That advice was a great help!

To all of you in the US: Happy Downton Day!

Kat

* * *

Robert

He regrets what he said to his mother before he has closed the door to the library, he very briefly considers turning back and apologizing for it, but just like him, his mother is not very good at talking about such things and he is sure that she knows that he is sorry. It is a family trait that he shares with his mother, sister and eldest daughter. They can all hurt each other very much, but they always know that things are not meant the way they are said. Maybe Cora did not really mean what she said, although if that was the case, he'd expect an apology from her. She is his wife, the one person in the world who is closer to him than anyone else and she had no right to hurt him the way she did over the past few weeks, but especially not to hurt him as much as she did over the course of the past few days.

When he enters his room, he hears the noise coming from his wife's room. He can hear her talk and give instructions to her lady's maid about what to pack. It seems as if she was packing everything. But that is what he wants, he wants to let her go because he is sure that she doesn't love him anymore. He is not sure whether he still loves her.

Once her lady's maid has left, he knocks on her door and when he sees her stone cold face, her emotionless eyes looking back at him, he knows that he doesn't love his wife anymore. Or maybe he still loves the woman she once was but not the woman she is now.

"What do you want?" she barks at him and he has a good mind to shut the door in her face but he decided on one last act of kindness, because while he regrets what he said to his mother, he also believes that there was some truth in it.

"I wanted to tell you that I am letting you go. I won't fight a divorce if you want to get one. I won't let you end up penniless. And I'll tell the girls and Tom to visit you in New York. And to bring their children along. But that is all."

She looks at him and he thinks that there is a glimmer of sadness in her eyes, but only for a second.

"Well, thank you for that. I'll probably ask my brother's lawyer to deal with the divorce proceedings."

Although that is what he expected, it still feels as if a knife had been stabbed into his heart and turned around several times. There is nothing he can say, so he only nods and turns around and once he has shut the door behind, he slides down to the ground and remains sitting on the floor for hours, staring into space without seeing or thinking anything.

* * *

Cora

She keeps staring at the door without seeing anything. She had hoped that Robert would try to stop her. By telling her that he still loved her, by telling her that he would pay more attention to her. She would have stayed. She would have fallen into his arms and stayed. She even would have stayed had he yelled at her for being unfair, for her behavior being unacceptable. He even might have had a point, maybe it would have been better to tell him about the invitation to New York in private, where he might have reacted differently.

But this she cannot bear. His easy manner of telling her that he wouldn't mind a divorce showed her that the reason he did not pay any attention to her, that he disregarded her was that he did not love her anymore. And she is almost sure that she does not love him anymore either. Or maybe she still loves the man he once was but not the man that he is now.

So she really leaves the next day and she meets Simon Bricker at a hotel in London. He greets her by kissing her on the cheek, in almost the same manner that Robert used to do until a few weeks ago and it sends a shiver down her spine.

"Cora," he says and it makes her feel slightly uncomfortable. But if she wants this to work, if she wants to rid herself of Robert, then she has to let this happen.

"Yes," she says and smiles. He smiles back at her, a genuine smile that shows how happy he is to see her and it seems to make it all so much easier.

"I am glad you came." She only nods, she can't say anything, although she begins to think that she is glad too. "Let me take you out tonight," he says and because she hasn't heard those words in months, she says "That would be very nice."

She gets changed, but when Baxter suggests a dark red dress, she asks for a different one. The dark red dress is Robert's favorite and she does not want to wear it for Mr. Bricker. It doesn't make any sense to her, but Baxter only says "very well my lady," in any case. She never asks any questions and right now that is exactly what she needs. Baxter has already told her that she will stay in New York with her only for a short while and then return to England, but she did not comment on it. She supposes her lady's maid hopes that she will return to England as well, but she doubts that she ever will very much.

Simon Bricker pays her more attention that night than Robert did in the last two months put together. He lets her lead their conversation, he compliments her, he lets her chose where they go, what they do and when they return to the hotel. He suggests taking her dancing but she refuses. She would like to go dancing of course, but she'd bring quite a scandal down on the family if she was seen going dancing with anyone but Robert and it is less than a week until they will be on their way to New York, where those things won't matter anymore. He nods in understanding when she explains this to him and says "Of course you don't want to subject your daughters to a scandal. And I admire you for it."

She very briefly thinks that he probably would only admire her half as much if he knew that she wants to protect Robert from the scandal just as much as their daughters, but she doesn't mention this as she doesn't really understand this feeling herself.

When they are back at the hotel, Simon accompanies her to her room and when they are at the door, he tries to kiss her.

"No," she says. "We could be seen."

"Then let me come into your room. No one would know. Our rooms have connecting doors, I'll come to you in a moment."

"No," she says again. "I'm sorry, but no." She is sure he does not only want to kiss her and she isn't ready for him to kiss her, much less for doing the other things that are clearly on his mind.

He nods and walks towards his room. On a whim she very swiftly walks to the door connecting their rooms and locks it. She is not sure whether he heard the lock click, but she is inexplicably afraid of him not granting her the wish of being left alone.

Simon doesn't mention the locked door the next day, so she supposes that he either didn't try to open the door or accepted her locking it. He shows her around another museum and compliments her on everything she says. He smiles at her continuously and tells her how beautiful she is. She hasn't felt this appreciated in months.

The spend the next three days in much the same fashion and on the evening before they are to leave for Liverpool where they will spend one night and then go on the ship to New York, she is sure about having made the right decision.

That night, before Simon and she go out, Rosamund is suddenly in front of her door and demands entrance. She lets her in because she still does not want to engulf the family in scandal and patiently listens to her sister-in-law talking about not giving up and giving Robert some credit but at the end of Rosamund's rather long speech, all she has to say is "I've made my decision and I will not reverse it. I've played the role of the Countess of Grantham and the loving wife long enough."

Rosamund looks at her as if she couldn't believe what she heard and then says "But you never played a role. You are the Countess of Grantham and you certainly are a loving wife. You can't tell me that you don't love Robert anymore. I refuse to believe it."

She asked Rosamund to leave after that and her sister-in-law did just that but not without mumbling "you are making the biggest mistake of your life right now".

The next day, when she and Simon are in the taxi that takes them to the train station from where they will go to Liverpool, they drive past Grantham House and it gives her a slight a pang that she knows that she will never enter it again. Robert and she spent so many happy days there. But that time is in the past. If it had been Robert instead of Rosamund at her door last night, she might have changed her mind, but Robert didn't even try to contact her. She is sure he is glad to be rid of her, to finally be free of that marriage of convenience.

When they get to Liverpool, Simon again asks her if he could share her room at night and she again refuses. She just isn't ready for another man to share her bed, not yet. "Maybe on the ship," she says and when she sees his crestfallen face she adds "but definitely in New York".


	4. Chapter 4

AN: Thank you for all the lovely reviews!

Please let me know what you think about this chapter!

Thank you,

Kat

* * *

Violet

She feels a little uncomfortable, waiting in Cora's hotel room. Not because she thinks she is invading her private space, Cora has not yet been in the room, but because she can't be sure that Cora will really enter the room by herself and she doesn't think that she could hold her tongue if she saw her entering a hotel room with any man but Robert.

She tried to talk her son into following Cora to London, she begged Rosamund to make Cora stay in London and wait for Robert, she wanted to send Mary and Edith after their mother, she asked Tom to talk sense into Robert, but nothing worked. Rosamund's effort were fruitless, Robert's pride was hurt too much, Mary and Edith had given up hope even before Cora left and Tom tried to talk to Robert once and received a dressing down worse than the one he got when Sybil and he announced their engagement.

So she decided to go after Cora herself. She just can't let the girl go without putting up a fight, she can't let Robert and Cora make themselves so unhappy. Despite what Robert said to her, she wants him happy. It hurt her, she can't deny it, it hurt her quite a lot because there was some truth in it. She of course knows that Robert sometimes says things he doesn't mean and then can't take them back. He is like her in that way. But she also knows that Robert has seen through her, that he knows what kind of marriage she had and that he is terribly afraid of having made Cora experience the same kind of marriage. Of course he hasn't, quite opposed to his father, Robert loves his wife, has made her an important part of his life and depended on her for the past 34 years and has thus created a life full of meaning for her. And no matter how much Robert hurt her, she cannot allow him to give up his marriage.

When the door opens she sees Cora and no one else except for two men who are carrying her suitcases to her very great relieve. It is obvious that Cora has to bite her tongue to not ask her what she is doing in her hotel room in front of the hotel servants, but 34 years as the wife of English aristocrat have taught her a lot of self-control.

"I've come to tell you a story," she says to Cora after the girl asked her what she was doing at the hotel once the servants have left.

"A story?" Cora looks at her quite disbelievingly; in fact she looks like a child waiting for a scolding. And that is what the girl deserves, but she knows her daughter-in-law well and a scolding would probably make her board the ship right now.

"Yes." Cora raises her eyebrow at that, but sits down and says "Well then."

And so she tells her the truth, the whole truth of how she almost ran off with Igor Kuragin, how they had already been on their way, how Igor's wife Irina stopped them and how very thankful she was to her for saving her.

"You are thankful? Why?" Cora asks. She is very unfriendly, but probably also rather shocked. Cora after all is about to leave her husband, to escape a marriage in which she does not feel appreciated anymore. The girl believes that her marriage has turned into the same kind of marriage that her parents-in-law's marriage was. She is quite sure that while Cora may not have seen through her as much as Robert did, she does have an inkling of what her mother-in-law's marriage must have been like.

"Because she saved me from a life in the shadows. And from never seeing my children again. Robert was four, Rosamund was six at the time. I would have regretted it for the rest of my life." Cora nods at this but then says

"But I wouldn't have to live in the shadows. Your story happened fifty years ago. I can get divorced. It will lead to a bit of a scandal, but it won't be anything close to what your running away would have caused. And my children are either grown up or dead."

The harsh way in which Cora refers to her dead children shocks her and it brings home to her how estranged Cora must feel from her family. She takes Cora's hands then, something she has only ever done three times before. When Sybil was born and Cora devastated about apparently not being able to give Robert a son. Although she had wanted a grandson to continue the line, she still told Cora not to be too worried, that there was an heir and that Robert would surely love their third daughter just as much as the other two. And that he loved her more than anything else in the world. When she thinks about it, she realizes that it is still true. The second time she held Cora's hand was when the one son Cora could have given Robert was born during the fifth month of the pregnancy and died without drawing one breath and the third time was after Sybil's death. Thinking about it still drives tears into her eyes. She has never seen anything more heartbreaking than Cora's empty eyes and fallen face the day after Sybil's death and never has anything broken her heart into more pieces than Robert's desperation about having lost his daughter and quite possibly his marriage. Losing a child is a pain she cannot imagine, does not want to imagine, losing a grandchild and Matthew was more than enough and she hopes to God that she will never have to go through what Robert, Cora and Isobel had to go through.

Cora looks a bit shocked when she takes her hands but doesn't pull them away.

"Cora, I know your situation is different. Very different. There are no small children you'd leave behind. But you'd leave behind a husband who loves you very much, who'd do anything for you. And that is worth more than you know. Because you have always had that. Or almost always." She hopes the girl will understand.

"He doesn't seem to be willing to do anything for me at the moment. He doesn't seem to love me at all." She knows that Cora is telling what she believes to be the truth but also that it isn't the truth.

"I know what it must seem like to you. And I asked Robert to follow you. Both to London and here. But he is too hurt. He is afraid of you sending him away, of telling him that you don't want him anymore. And that would break him. It would utterly destroy him."

Cora just stares at her without saying a word. So she continues.

"And it would destroy you too. I know you better than you think and no matter how much you are fascinated by that Mr. Bricker, he will never make you as happy as Robert. Because you love Robert just as much as he loves you."

There are tears running down Cora's face and the girl shakes her head and then asks her to leave, a request she fulfills because she knows that her daughter-in-law needs some time to think about it all. So she squeezes her hand wordlessly, gets up, leaves and then closes the door behind her.

* * *

Cora

She watches as her mother-in-law closes the door and as soon as the door has fallen shut, she can't hold back her tears anymore. She throws herself onto the bed and grabs the pillow that Robert would sleep on if he was with her. Imagining Robert with her makes her cry even more and she can't help but wonder about the story she heard. She feels sorry for Robert's mother, she understands why she wanted to leave her marriage and she understands why she is glad that she didn't. Violet might seem cold shouldered and unfeeling, but she knows that Violet loves both her children very much and that it still hurts her in a way that Robert had to enter a loveless marriage just to save the estate, that she condemned him to the kind of marriage his parents had. Cora knows that she and Robert were very lucky, that no one ever expected them to be happy, that contentment was all that was ever thought to be in store for them.

And then suddenly she regrets telling Simon that she would let him share her bed in New York. Because she can't imagine ever letting another man into her bed. She doesn't want anyone but Robert sleeping next to her and she certainly doesn't want to be kissed or touched by anyone else.

And then she remembers that Robert hasn't really kissed or touched her in months, not with as much passion and feeling as he used to do, that he isn't interested anymore, that he has cast her away.

And then she realizes that maybe she has to let someone else into her bed and into her heart to ever feel appreciated again and she knows that Simon would appreciate her, would take care of her, would love her, maybe already loves her.

But if she really were to leave and start a new life with another man, then Robert might find someone else as well. Another woman to share his bed. And she can't stomach the thought of Robert kissing someone else or worse sleeping with someone else and worst of all, lying next to another woman and gently brushing her hair out of her face and just holding her in his arms. She knows that Robert would still be considered to be a good catch for many women, he does not have an heir, George would certainly not count for many women, and thus he might actually find a woman young enough to still have children, to finally give him a son, to finally fulfill his heart's desire.

She remembers Robert swearing to her that he was not disappointed in her, that he didn't care that he didn't have a son a few weeks after her miscarriage. He told that of course he was just as devastated by their loss as her but that it was not about having lost a boy but about having lost a child conceived out of love. And she believed him, she still believes those words to be true.

On the other hand, Robert and she carry a lot of baggage, fights, near betrayal, two dead children. Maybe life would be better if she left it all behind.

She just can't get to a decision, her thoughts keep spinning in her head, and she doesn't see any way out, she doesn't know what to do.

She doesn't know what she wants until the sun comes up again, she hasn't slept at all, but she has finally come to a decision, has made up her mind and sworn to herself to not waver from it anymore.

The hustle and bustle at the harbor help her mind to not wander off and go through the same arguments again and again and she is glad about it, because when she sees the ship, it is hard for her to not question her decision again.

About an hour later she leans on the banister, completely exhausted. She knows that she can't change anything anymore and maybe the finality of it all will make it easier for her to accept the decision she has made. She lets her eyes sweep across the harbor and when she sees him standing at the gate, looking after the ship, when she sees that he has come to see her leave, it breaks her heart.

"Robert," she says and he looks at her. She is amazed that he heard her over the noise, over the distance, but probably he just looked at her the moment she said his name by mere coincidence.


	5. Chapter 5

AN: Sorry this took such a long time, but I rewrote most of the chapter. But it is by far the longest chapter in this story, so maybe that makes up for the wait :)

I will post an epilogue in the next few days and then this story has come to its end. I am working on another multichapter story about Robert and Cora when they were young but I have no idea how much time I will need for that. I'd like to write a fluffy oneshot for Valentines Day, so if there is anything you'd like me to write about, just let me know. It can be from any universe that I've written in :)

Thanks for all the reviews and the last chapter and please let me know what you think about this one!

Thank you!

Kat

* * *

Mary

She keeps staring at Tom and Edith in turn. Quite unusual for her, she doesn't know what to say and she also doesn't want to be by herself. She, just like Edith, is scared that their father made a mistake. They both think that he should not have gone to Liverpool to watch the ship leave. He said he wanted to do it to get closure, he said he needed to see her leave to believe that she had really left. But Mary is sure that it will hurt her father very much to see it, that it is something that he will not get over easily, maybe it is something that he will never be able to get over. There have of course already been rumors about the impending separation and divorce of the Earl and Countess of Grantham, and Lady Maria Brixton, a woman who was presented with Edith, has already asked for an invitation to Downton. It doesn't surprise her, not at all. Her father's lack of an heir apparent makes him very interesting to women much younger than him. And it bothers her. Not because it would mean that George would after all not be the next Earl of Grantham, but because she cannot imagine a woman who is not her mother being the Countess of Grantham. Edith and she agreed that if their father were to marry again, they'd both leave Downton, they are both sure that their aunt would welcome them with open arms, although Edith said that their mother would certainly welcome them too, but seeing her mother with another man would be just as unbearable as seeing her father with another woman.

She knows that her grandmother has gone to Liverpool as well but she isn't sure that that will be helpful at all. Her mother and grandmother have never gotten along very well and she wonders if her grandmother's idea of 'setting that girl's head straight' won't backfire terribly and seal the deal in Simon Bricker's favor. Tom assured her that the the Dowager must have more up her sleeve than just telling Cora that she was causing a great scandal, but she couldn't really believe him.

For the millionth time she wonders if she shouldn't have gone after her mother, if she shouldn't have told her how much she still misses Matthew, how she wishes every day that he wasn't dead, how she is afraid that her parents can't really appreciate what they have. But it is too late now. However, she resolves to be there for her father, to help him any way she can and to prevent her father from falling into the arms of another woman out of sheer desperation. A divorce after all takes a long time and if Tom really were to go to Boston, she is sure that she could convince him to visit her mother in New York and to prevail upon her good senses. She also plans to write to her grandmother in New York, even if she doesn't like her too much, she is sure that the woman would not like her daughter divorcing an earl. She is just waiting for her father to tell them that their mother really left for New York and then she will write the letter and beg her Grandmama for help. Of course she hopes that her father will return to Downton accompanied by her mother, but she thinks it is a hope in vain.

* * *

Robert

The moment the ship begins to move he knows that Edith and Mary were right. They both told him not to go to Liverpool, to not watch their mother leave. "It'll break your heart Papa, and you will never recover from it. The picture of Mama boarding the ship to leave you is something you will never forget", Edith warned him. He knew what she was alluding to, when Michael Gregson left for Germany, she accompanied him to the train station only to never see him return. It would be different for Cora and him though, Cora will in all likelihood not be lost, not to all of them, just to him.

He actually did not see her boarding the ship, maybe he was too late for that, maybe he just didn't see her among the many people in the harbor. And maybe it was better that way. Just knowing that she is on the ship, that she is taken away from him, that she lets herself be taken away from him voluntarily, that it is at least in part his fault, is a pain beyond what he can bear. The tears begin to run down his cheeks and he doesn't try to hold them back. He is making a spectacle of himself, English gentlemen are not supposed to show their emotions, but he doesn't care about any of it, Cora leaving has utterly destroyed him, all the habits that have been engrained to him since birth don't matter anymore, nothing matters anymore.

He thinks that he is going crazy, that his mind must be playing tricks on him and it doesn't surprise him. He has after all lost the person that has kept him sane for the past three and half decades, but he thinks that he heard Cora say his name. He involuntarily looks to his right, he doesn't want to turn because he knows that he will only be disappointed, but he can't help it.

* * *

Cora

The moment their eyes meet, he begins to run, pushes people including old women and children, out of his way and then crashes into her, wraps his arms around her and begins to sob uncontrollably. She wants to withstand him, wants to free herself from him, she isn't ready for this, but when she feels his tears wet her cheek, her arms move of their own accord and wrap themselves around him and she holds on to him as tightly and desperately as he holds on to her.

It is the second time this happened to her. After Sybil's death, when Dr. Clarkson told them that Sybil would have died regardless of what they would have done for her, Robert walked towards her and put his arms around her. And she had wanted to free herself then, just as she wanted to do it now, but she couldn't help it, her heart overruled her mind then and she grabbed hold of Robert and it had felt as if the weight of the world had been lifted of her shoulders.

And that is exactly how she feels now. As if all the pain and heartache that she has been through in the last few months had suddenly been taken from her.

"Cora," he says and a new wave of tears wet her cheek.

She lets him cry, lets him hides his face against her because she knows that is what he needs right now. And it isn't necessary for everyone around them to see him cry, it is already quite enough that he pushed children and old women out of his way just to get to her. It takes him a few minutes to calm down, but eventually he moves away from her a little, although he doesn't let go of her and then says "I am so glad you stayed."

She shakes her head at this.

"Robert," she sighs. "I didn't stay. I just haven't left yet." He looks at her, begging for an explanation without words.

"Let's take a walk," she says and then turns away from him. When he doesn't move, she holds out her hand to him.

"Robert, please."

Reluctantly he takes her hand and his touch sends a jolt of longing through her. A longing for everything to turn back to normal now. It is not her plan to just go back, she thought about it for a long time, but she can't just return to the Abbey. She just can't return to being put to the sidelines again.

They keep on walking in silence, but still holding hands, until they have left the harbor.

"If you don't want to stay, then why didn't you leave?" Robert asks once it has become quieter around them. He sounds very angry, but he still doesn't let go of her hand.

"Because I don't know what to do. I can't be pushed to the sidelines again. That is not how our marriage works. But I also couldn't leave without talking to you again. Calmly and preferably without us yelling at each other or biting each other's heads off and without me wanting to hurt you."

Robert nods at that, solemnly and then says

"I suppose you have still got your hotel room."

"Yes."

"Then maybe we should go there."

So they walk to her hotel, still holding hands and she feels Robert guiding her around other people. It is something he hasn't done in months. When they arrive at the hotel she tells the concierge that her husband came to Liverpool to surprise her but that there was no need to make a fuss because he would be staying in her suite. When she says that, she sees Robert relax a little next to her and wonders if he expected her to demand that he get his own room.

Once the door is closed behind them, he looks at her and then without preamble asks "If I hadn't come here, what would you have done?"

She wonders if she should tell him the truth, but on the whole thinks that it is better to lay her cards on the table.

"I'd have asked you to come to London."

"So you wouldn't have returned to Downton."

"No. No, I don't think I would have been able to return there." He takes a deep breath, nods and there are worry and sadness edged all over his face.

"When will you leave for New York?" After more than 34 years of marriage, she knows Robert well enough to know that the question that sounded so emotionless is full of emotions and that he is very close to bursting into tears again.

"I don't know," she says and stares at him. "I just don't know. I haven't booked another crossing yet." He nods again and then turns away from her, his shoulders slumped.

She feels a sudden urge to walk over to him, to put her arms around him and to tell him that she will never go to New York, that she will return to Downton with him, but she can't, not this easily. He remains turned away from her without saying anything for a few minutes but she knows she has to leave him to it now. She knows that he will eventually speak and so he does.

"If you are sure that you will go to New York then why did you not leave today?"

"I already told you that. I wanted to talk to you first."

"Why?"

"Because," she doesn't know how to go on. She doesn't really know. "I owe you an apology. I shouldn't have told you like that. I should have told you in private."

He turns to her now, walks to her, and she waits for him to reach her. It feels like an eternity. He only begins to speak when he is standing right in front of her, so close that she can feel his breath, so close that she can count his eye lashes, so close that she would only have to lean forward slightly to kiss him.

"Cora, is there anything, anything that I could say or do to make you reconsider?"

She wants to say that he has already done that, that by coming to Liverpool he has made everything so much better, but she can't and she doesn't know why. Maybe it is her pride overruling her heart.

"I don't know. I wish there was something." At least that she can admit that. That she wishes she could change her mind.

"Cora," he breathes rather than says and then he leans forward and captures her lips in a kiss. She wants to back away, but Robert has got his left hand on the back of her head and he doesn't let her back away and she is a glad about it because he kisses her with more passion than he has in the last months put together and she gives in to her urge to kiss him back.

"Robert," she says when he breaks their kiss.

"I wanted to show you that I am better at it than that art dealer." There are so many things wrong with this statement, so many things to offend her, but what she says to him is

"I have no idea how good he is at kissing."

Robert looks at her as if he couldn't believe it and then shakes his head.

"You never kissed him?" he asks and then she shakes her head too.

"No. He tried, but I couldn't do it."

"So you never did anything else with him either?" Again she should be offended, how can her own husband trust so little, but all she says is again

"No. He tried, but I couldn't do it."

"Oh, thank the heavens," Robert says, sits down on the sofa, pulls her down with him and then takes her hands in his. "I was scared. So scared. I had that picture in my mind of him in our bedroom, I just couldn't get over it and I've been imaging God knows what."

She looks at her joint hands and then up at him.

"Why don't you trust me? Why couldn't you believe that I didn't ask him to come to me in the middle of night?" She can see that Robert doesn't want to talk about this, but they need to talk about it, she needs to know why he didn't trust her.

"I believe you now. But darling, you flirted with that man. Shamelessly. I warned you about his intention, you disregarded my warning. To me it seemed as if that was what you wanted." She wants to yell at him, tell him how wrong he is, how disappointed she is, but she told him that they needed to talk calmly and so she says

"What I wanted Robert, was your attention. And I know you wanted to give it to me in London and I am sorry, so very sorry about not having returned to Rosamund's on time. I would have preferred to go out with you. But the dressing down you gave me was below the belt. Not because of your warning about Mr. Bricker but because you told me that you thought it unbelievable that someone would care about my opinions. And you said it more than once."

"Cora, he is an expert, someone who has studied art history. I would never doubt that there is no one in our family who knows more about our art than you do, but you are not an art historian." Again she has to bite her tongue.

"No, that I am not. But it wasn't really about that. You didn't care for my opinions on anything. And whenever I asked a question you either ignored me or told me that it was nothing to bother me with and that hurt me."

"I am sorry. But I withdrew from you because you were so … chummy with that art dealer." She nods, because she understands that. Even if she doesn't agree. Robert withdrew from her before she ever met Simon Bricker.

"It started before that I think. But maybe I did not make it better exactly." Robert now rubs his thumbs over her hands.

"No. You didn't. And I am afraid that we are both at fault. Although I think that I am more at fault than you." She nods because that is what she thinks too. Had Robert not neglected her, she would never have turned towards Simon Bricker, or at least she wouldn't have let it go this far.

"When you go to New York, will you live with him?" It is a question she has asked herself a million times already.

"I don't know. I could also live with my mother or my brother. Or by myself."

"I hate thinking about you all alone in that huge city." This makes her chuckle.

"Robert. I would have servants."

"I know. But regardless of that. I hate the thought of you being alone. I hate the thought of you being without me."

This makes her smile a sad smile.

"You are jealous."

"Yes. I don't deny it. I am jealous of every one who is able to spend time with you when I am not." She knows that Robert means this as a declaration of love and it makes her sway. It makes her want to be with him.

"Cora, please. Stay with me. I can't be without you. Please."

She suddenly remembers what her mother-in-law told her. That Robert and she were very lucky, that their marriage was one beyond comparison.

And then her mind finally realizes what her heart has been telling her ever since the moment that she saw Robert watching the ship leave. It is Robert's attention and love she wants, not that of Simon Bricker. That is why she told Bricker she would not go to New York with him, not now in any case. He was shocked and sad and it made her believe that he really cares for her, maybe even loves her, but she is certain that he does not love her the way that Robert loves her, it is not possible for Simon Bricker to love her that way, because she is not the mother of his children, they haven't been through what Robert and she have been through, they never would go through anything even remotely close to a child dying or him having to go to war and her being afraid for his life every single day. And she still loves Robert. More than anything or anyone else in the world.

"We'd have to work on our marriage. This can't happen again." He squeezes her hands again.

"Let's start that now. How about I take you out tonight? Let's have dinner and then go dancing."

"We haven't eaten lunch yet."

"Then let's go get lunch. And afterwards we can walk around the city. Then we return here, get changed, go to dinner, then dancing and then, well, it is up to you what we do then." She closes her eyes at that for a moment and remembers their kiss from only half an hour before. When she opens her eyes again she touches Robert's cheek.

"It is not unlikely that we have the same thing in mind for that." She can see that it makes him happy when she says this and he pulls her to her feet to take her to lunch.

They spend a wonderful day together, a day walking around a city neither of them knows very well, a day spent talking about estate business and their children and grandchildren. Much later that day when they are dancing much closer than they should, she puts her head on Robert's shoulder and says "I love you".

He seems to completely forget that they are in public and presses a kiss on her cheek. "I love you too. Very much."

They go to their hotel two dances later and when Robert very tentatively and gently begins to kiss her, she kisses him back with as much passion as she can. She is absolutely sure that this is what she wants and when they are lying on their bed, skin to skin and still out of breath and Robert holds her to him, with both his arms around her, she murmurs "Please don't ever let me go again."

"No," he says. "I promise." He kisses her forehead first and then her lips to seal the promise and as if to proof each other how serious they are about all of this, they fall asleep in each other's arms with nothing in between them.


	6. Chapter 6

I am sorry this took such a long time, but I just have to work so much that I don't have time for anything else.

Thanks for the review on the last chapter!

Please let me know what think about this chapter!

Kat

* * *

Epilogue - Set the morning after the last chapter

Robert

He slowly wakes up and tries to stay asleep, because he dreamed that Cora had changed her mind, that in the end she had preferred him over Bricker, but he knows that it can't be true. So he shuts his eyes as tightly as possible and tries to fall back to sleep. He is sure he has fallen back to sleep when he thinks that he feels someone gently brushing the hair out of his forehead. It is done with so much care that it can only be done by Cora, so maybe he has gone mad.

"Robert," she whispers and now he is sure that he has gone mad. "Darling, open your eyes. If you keep squeezing them shut like that, you'll get a headache." That is true and although he does not care about a headache later on, he opens his eyes and looks directly into hers.

"You really are here," he says.

"Of course I am here. What did you think I would do? Ask you to never let me go again and then leave?"

"I thought it was a dream."

"It wasn't," Cora says and smiles. Her pale blue eyes sparkle in the morning light and she leans towards him to give him a kiss. He enjoys the feeling of her soft lips on his and tries to take it further but she very gently stops him.

"Your mother might still be here. We should see whether she would like to have breakfast with us."

He is astonished beyond words.

"What is my mother doing here?"

"She came to tell me a story."

"A story."

"A story that she thought would make me change my mind. And it did. In a way at least."

"Tell me, please. I want to know what she said that made you reconsider." He hopes it wasn't some stupid childhood story, something that his mother believes to be 'sweet', but that would probably not have changed Cora's mind.

"I am not sure I can tell you," she says and the look she gives him is full of concern, obvious concern for his well-being.

"She isn't ill, is she?" He hopes to God she isn't. He hopes that it was not an illness on his mother's part that made Cora stay.

"No. But that story will make your ears burn. And if anyone ever found out, your mother would be in the soup." This intrigues him rather a lot, although it also worries him.

"I don't know whether to be amused or afraid." Cora chuckles at that and touches his face again.

"I'd prefer you to be amused by it. There is no reason to be afraid though. I'll tell you if you want me to, but it might hurt you." He wonders what kind of story his mother could have told Cora that would hurt him, but if he is honest with himself, he doesn't care whether the story will hurt him, as long as he can listen to Cora tell that story. Because he thought that he would never listen to her telling him anything again.

"I can take it," he says to her and squeezes the hand that he is holding.

They both sit up and he listens to her talk about his mother and Prince Kuragin and Princess Irina and how the Princess stopped his mother from leaving forever.

"I was four then," he says and looks at her. "If I had treated you the way I treated you these past months when the girls were still that small, would you have left?"

"No. I wouldn't have considered it. But your mother says that she is very thankful to the Princess for having saved her from the pain of never seeing Rosamund or you again. And she was honest about that." He smiles a sad smile at her now.

"I knew my parents weren't as happy as we are. They were content, I suppose. They had to be because being unhappy in a marriage would have been a failure. It is sad, if you think about it. They had been married for over thirty years when my father died and not once were they blissfully happy, not with each other. And I knew my father had a mistress. He told me that should I find that I could not be happy with you, I shouldn't hesitate to have one myself. He asked me to be careful to not father a child outside our marriage too early. But that was all. I asked him then if I had any half-siblings I didn't know about and he said no and I believed him. I still believe him because he loved Rosamund and me and he would have loved any other child as well. So I am not too shocked. Although I am a little amused. Imagine my mother being pulled out a carriage by a Russian princess in Russia in the middle of the night." He grins at her now and then begins to laugh. That was obviously not the reaction she expected but she begins to laugh too. They haven't laughed together for such a long.

"Did you ever consider having a mistress?" she asks him after a while.

"No. I swore to myself that I would give us a chance to be happy and to make that possible, I knew I couldn't have a mistress right away. So I decided to wait at least three years. Of course a mistress was the last thing on my mind on our third wedding anniversary." He actually doesn't really remember their third anniversary, there have been so many that it is impossible to remember them all and he is sure that Cora doesn't really remember it either, but it doesn't matter. By their third wedding anniversary they had been so deeply in love and so devoted to one another that the mere thought of one of them straying from their marriage bed seemed ridiculous. And it is still a ridiculous thought.

"You know that even if I had gone to New York with him, I wouldn't have let him into my bed, don't you?"

"I do." Until she said it, he wouldn't have been sure, maybe Cora hadn't even been sure herself, but now he is sure and so is she. Of course she wouldn't have gone to bed with another man. What they have is too special to ever be recreated with someone else. They both know it. Neither one of them could ever be happy with someone else.

"Good." The smile that appears on Cora's face now is so heart-warming and beautiful that he has to kiss her.

It is again Cora who stops them from doing more than just kiss fleetingly and they get dressed and are told that his mother is indeed in the breakfast room. They walk into the room hand in hand and a small smile appears on his mother's face when she sees them, although she is able to keep it under control.

"So you've come to your senses then," she says and both Cora and he answer "Yes". His mother shakes her head at them but then asks them to join her for breakfast.

"I am returning to Downton today," she says and the looks at them. "I'll tell the family that you wanted to spend some time in London on your own." He is surprised by this by Cora says "Thank you," and smiles.

They say goodbye to his mother and then go to London. Cora breaks down in tears when they enter their bedroom at Grantham House. He is afraid that she regrets her decision but before he is even able to ask, she tells him that she thought that she would never return to their house again and that their marriage was over. He pulls her close to him and lets her cry herself out. He knows she needs to cry, just as he needed to cry the day before.

"I love you," he whispers to her once she has stopped to cry.

They spend a few days in London, just by themselves and it has a healing effect on their marriage. When they return to Downton, he falls asleep on the train and Cora wakes him shortly before they arrive.

"Wake up, darling. We'll be home soon."

He helps her get out of the train and when she doesn't let go off him when she is safely on the platform and he hears someone call out for them and he turns around and sees Mary, Edith, Tom, Sybbie and George waiting for them, he knows that they have indeed come home, that he, against all odds, has brought his darling wife home.


End file.
